Activists want N-word gone from Calif. gravestones

EL DORADO HILLS, Calif. — Time has weathered the 36 concrete gravestones in a dusty, half-century-old cemetery tucked away in a corner of California's former gold fields. Time has not erased, however, the bigotry of a bygone era carved into the markers.

The dead, both black and white, had been moved from a Gold Rush-era hamlet known as Negro Hill in the 1950s to make way for a reservoir.

The problem is the way the markers continue to identify them almost 60 years later.

Now a handful of activists are trying to get the markers replaced with ones bearing what they say was the original name, Negro Hill.

Dr. Ralph White, President of the Stockton Black Leadership Council, center, dusts off one of the 36 grave markers that had been moved from the gold rush era Negro Hill Cemetery to the Mormon Island Relocation Cemetery near Folsom, Calif. The burial plots from Negro Hill went unmarked for more than half a century — until a contractor hired by the Army Corps of Engineers moved the bodies to make way for a lake, and marked the graves with stones that used a derogatory term for African-American. Now, some 60 years later, a handful of activists are trying to change the offensive gravestones, only to find their good intentions snagged on government bureaucracy.

Us Army Corps Of Engineers Photo / AP

This photo provided by the Army Corps of Engineers and taken in the 1950's, graves of the unknown are seen marked at the Negro Hill Cemetery, in Negro Hill, Calif. The burial plots from Negro Hill went unmarked for more than half a century — until a contractor hired by the Army Corps of Engineers moved the bodies to make way for a lake, and marked the graves with stones that used a derogatory term for African-American.

Rich Pedroncelli / AP

Nne of the grave makers using the n-word is seen over one of the 36 bodies that had been moved from the gold rush era Negro Hill Cemetery to the Mormon Island Relocation Cemetery near Folsom, Calif. The burial plots from Negro Hill went unmarked for more than half a century — until a contractor hired by the Army Corps of Engineers moved the bodies to make way for a lake, and marked the graves with stones that used a derogatory term for African-American. Now, some 60 years later, a handful of activists are trying to change the offensive gravestones, only to find their good intentions snagged on government bureaucracy.